Raccoon Removal in Kennesaw, GA

Raccoons in your Kennesaw home

The forest on Kennesaw Mountain gives raccoons hollow trees, creek bottoms and plenty of food, and they don't stay in the park. At night they travel the slopes into nearby neighborhoods, checking garbage, pet bowls and bird feeders. Around Kennesaw State, rental houses with trash bins packed past the lid draw them in too. A raccoon doesn't wait for an opening: it pulls back a soffit, lifts shingles or bends a vent with its hands, and an older downtown chimney without a cap is basically a ready-made den.

Most raccoons in a Kennesaw attic or chimney are females that picked the spot to raise young. That makes the job more than catching one animal. The law decides what can be done with it, the kits have to be found, and the latrine it left behind is a real health issue. Here is how a licensed Cobb County pro handles each of those.

Georgia law: removal, not relocation

Georgia classifies the raccoon as a rabies-vector species, along with skunks, foxes, bobcats and coyotes. Under O.C.G.A. 27-2-10, a trapped raccoon can't legally be driven somewhere and let go; the lawful outcome is removal, not relocation. Moving raccoons would also spread disease, and most released animals don't survive anyway. Handling a rabies-vector animal within the law is one of the main reasons this belongs with a licensed operator.

What a raccoon in the attic sounds like

A squirrel scurries; a raccoon walks. People describe it as sounding like there's a dog in the attic — heavy, slow movement, usually at night. If there are young, you may also hear a high chattering from one spot in the attic or from the chimney. That sound tells the pro there are kits to find before any hole is closed.

Kits first, then the seal

Georgia raccoons usually have their young from late winter into spring. Kits can't leave by themselves, so trapping the mother and sealing the hole leaves them to die, and then the problem becomes an odor and fly problem. Pros often use cameras to locate the litter in insulation, wall cavities or a chimney smoke shelf. Generally the mother is removed first and the kits right after, unless the whole family can be taken out together.

The latrine and roundworm risk

Raccoons pick one spot to use as a toilet and keep using it. Their feces can carry Baylisascaris roundworm, whose eggs survive a long time and can infect people, so the latrine has to be bagged out and the area sanitized, not swept up. Insulation that's soaked or matted under the latrine should come out, but a whole-attic insulation replacement isn't always needed; a good pro shows you what's actually contaminated.

How raccoons get into Kennesaw homes

On hillside lots, raccoons often start under a raised deck or beside a walkout basement, then climb a downspout or corner to reach the roof. Soffit returns, the corner where a lower roof meets a wall, and roof vents are the usual break-in points. Near downtown, older houses with masonry chimneys and no cap add a straight shot into the flue. Wherever the raccoon got in, the damage is easy to see from the ground once you know to look.

A seal that holds up to a raccoon

A raccoon will test any repair, so the closure has to be stronger than a squirrel patch: heavy-gauge metal, fastened down, and a proper chimney cap. Then cut what drew the animal in — bins with locking lids or kept in the garage until pickup, no pet food left out overnight, feeders brought in. In a student rental, the landlord and tenants both need to be on board, because a single overfilled trash can is enough to bring the next raccoon back.